Although several members of the class of organic thiocarbonates have been known for many years and various routes have been employed for their synthesis, the s,s′-bis-(α,α′-disubstituted-α″-acetic acid)-trithiocarbonate compounds of the present invention have not been disclosed. Trithiocarbonate compounds have been claimed for various applications, such as pesticides for agriculture, and also as lubricating oil additives.
Traditional methods of producing block copolymers, such as by living polymerization or the linking of end functional polymers, suffer many disadvantages, such as the restricted type monomers which can be utilized, low conversion rates, strict requirements on reaction conditions, and monomer purity. Difficulties associated with end linking methods include conducting reactions between polymers, and problems of producing a desired pure end functional polymer. The s,s′-bis-(α,α′-disubstituted-α″-acetic acid)-trithiocarbonate compounds of the present invention can alleviate the above noted problems and difficulties when utilized in free radical polymerizations.
The prior art WO98/01478 reference discloses the use of thiocarbonates to conduct living free radical polymerizations. The reference is limited to alkyl and benzyl functional groups, and is unable to make any aryl or carboxylic acid substituted trithiocarbonates with general methods known to the art. Synthesis, p 894 (1986), J. Chemical Research (Synopsis), p 478 (1995), and Synthetic Communications, Vol. 18, p 1531 (1988). We have also found the conversion for the dibenzyl derivatives disclosed in their example 26 to be very slow compared to the present invention when polymerizing acrylate, as can be seen in the Example section of this application.